The British son of jailed Hong Kong media entrepreneur Jimmy Lai criticized the UK government for failing to put conditions on his father’s release during the Chinese prime minister’s visit last week.
Speaking at a parliamentary hearing on Tuesday, Sebastien Lai said his father’s imprisonment was not only a humanitarian and national security issue, but an issue “where our values are locked” with him.
The comments come after the first trip to China by a UK leader in eight years, where Keir Starmer is said to have raised the case of the former media tycoon and one of Hong Kong’s most important pro-democracy voices.
In December 2025, Lai, a British citizen, was convicted of national security violations in December after a nearly two-year trial that international rights groups criticized as politically motivated and an attack on press freedom.
Weeks before the prime minister’s visit, Lai is known to have met with the foreign secretary, Yvette Cooper, and discussed the importance of her father’s case as well as the deteriorating health of the 78-year-old in solitary confinement.
“If it is so important then there should be some conditions put on my father’s release. The trip is a big thing given, the embassy too,” Lai said, speaking at a all-party parliamentary group on arbitrary detention and hostage affairs hearing his father’s case.
The UK government wants closer ties with the world’s second-largest economy and approved a new Chinese embassy in London last month. While there were some visible gains from the trip – a visa waiver, the lifting of sanctions on British MPs and peers, and Chinese investment in British companies – criticism came from parliamentarians who asked why the prime minister traveled to Beijing with the embassy “in our back pocket” without first securing Lai’s release.
“Time is running out for my father,” Lai said. “Surely a man who defends liberty deserves his own.”
Lai is understood to have been told that his father’s case had been raised by Starmer during his visit, although he has not met the prime minister or foreign secretary since. There is no indication when his father’s sentence will take place, Sebastien said, adding that it would be a disaster for both governments if his father died in prison.
“It’s a tragedy that the only thing that came out of this trip was Johnnie Walker not Jimmy Lai,” said former Hong Kong governor Chris Patten referring to the reduction in whiskey taxes agreed between the two countries during Starmer’s visit.
“We are told that the PM has raised the Jimmy Lai case,” Lord Patten said. “What we don’t know is that the Chinese said in response … what was the extent of their discussion?”
While a change in urgency on behalf of the government was noted by the head of Lai’s international legal team, Caoilfhionn Gallagher KC – who met Starmer and Cooper – he said the strategy remained to be seen.
“We’re not hiding the fact that we think there was a strategic mistake in not setting the condition,” Gallagher said. “It feels to us that the UK is not necessarily playing the cards it has as well as it could.”